Additional revealing details on Raw’s peak viewership by minute for the Performance Center-based crowd-free Raw with Edge, Austin, Undertaker, Rumble replay

This week’s episode of WWE Monday Night Raw took place at the Performance Center in Orlando, Fla., although roughly half of the three hours consisted of a replay of the Royal Rumble from January. PWTorch has obtained minute-by-minute viewership data for Raw which reveals viewership patterns beyond the often-deceptive quarter hour ratings (which is an average of 15 minutes, which can be brought down by two commercials breaks in one segment compared to one break in other segments).

It turns out the peak viewership came during the Rumble replay, but it wasn’t very far above the peak viewership for Edge’s segment at the start and the Undertaker-Styles contract signing that followed. The segment with Steve Austin at the end rebounded slightly from the lowest stretch in the middle 30 minutes of hour three. However, the third hour overall wasn’t that much lower than a typical third hour of Raw, so it was more a case of Edge, the Rumble replay, and Undertaker drawing in extra viewers, not Rey Mysterio vs. Andrade or Becky Lynch driving away typical viewers.

Quarter hour average viewership was as follows:

HOUR ONE…

• Q1: 2.423 million (Edge promo, peaked over 2.6M)
• Q2: 2.263 million (Rumble replay began, peaks over 2.4M)
• Q3: 2.384 million (Rumble continued, peaked over 2.6M)
• Q4: 2.577 million (Rumble continued, peaked over 2.8K)

HOUR TWO…

• Q5: 2.590 million (Rumble match took the first 53 minutes of the second hour, peaked over 2.8M)
• Q6: 2.446 million (Peaked over 2.6M)
• Q7: 2.507 million (Peaked over 2.7M)
• Q8: 2.402 million (Lawler introduced Taker-Styles segment, peaked over 2.6M)

HOUR THREE…

• Q9: 2.348 million (Undertaker-A.J. Styles segment, one partial commercial break, peaked above 2.6M)
• Q10: 2.011 million (Andrade vs. Rey Mysterio, one full break, two partial breaks, peaked over 2.1M)
• Q11: 1.978 million (Becky Lynch segment, Kevin Owens interview, two commercial breaks, peaked over 2.1M)
• Q12: 2.095 million (Steve Austin segment, one commercial break, peaked above 2.2M)

So some key points here: The Rumble replay drew the highest peak viewership, crossing for a few minutes here and there over 2.8 million, whereas the Edge segment peaked at 2.6 million. There was a drop-off after the Rumble, and not a huge rebound for Steve Austin whose segment peaked at 2.2 million, not too far above the peaks of 2.1 million for the Andrade vs. Rey match and Becky-Baszler segment, and below the 2.6 million peak for Undertaker-Styles. That said, the third hour usually does the lowest rating overall.

RELATED: Results are in for WWE Raw rating in empty Performance Center built around Steve Austin special appearance and Royal Rumble replay – key metrics and trends